METRO VANCOUVER -- Despite her popularity and a crackdown on crime, Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts can’t beat the image that her city is unsafe.

Half of Surrey residents surveyed by an Insights West poll said they believe crime has increased in the past five years. A similar number say they are afraid to walk alone in their neighbourhoods at night. One third of Surrey residents also said they have been a victim of crime, while 58 per cent worried it could happen to them.

That’s a far cry from Vancouver, where more than half of those surveyed believe crime has stayed the same, and where 88 per cent don’t have a problem going out alone after dark.

“The numbers on crime stuff in Surrey are astonishing,” said Mario Canseco, a vice-president of Insights West. “I mean, half of Surrey residents saying ‘I am afraid of walking late at night in my own neighbourhood’ is something I have never seen.”

Canseco acknowledged, however, that the poll comes after a record 25 murders in Surrey last year, including the Dec. 29 fatal beating of hockey mom Julie Paskall, which may have affected the results. Surrey is also a victim of earlier high-profile crimes.

“If we had done this two months before or after it may have been different,” Canseco said.

However, the poll suggests residents do not blame the mayor for crime, Canseco said. Watts has a 73-per-cent approval rating as she seeks her fourth term as mayor.

This is likely because Watts has addressed crime “head-on,” he said, by holding town hall meetings to let the public know what’s going on.

“I think people are looking at it and saying ‘yes we are worried, yes we feel unsafe, but it is not something we believe has to be blamed on the mayor alone.’”

Residents cited a combination of factors for the rising crime rate, such as not having a community court in Surrey, increasing mental health and addiction issues, and insufficient policing. These issue require intervention from senior levels of government.

In Clayton, one of Surrey’s newest high-density neighbourhoods, vandalism and theft is becoming common because perpetrators can hide in the thick jungle of homes, said Mike Bola, president of the Cloverdale Community Association. Bola maintains the community is too dense, with few facilities for the increasing numbers of youth and a lack of transportation for them to get around.

Transportation was the second biggest issue cited in the poll, with 18 per cent of Surrey residents surveyed saying it was important.

“I have heard in Clayton area they can’t even take our kids our there without worrying about some kind of gunfire,” Bola said.

Watts acknowledges that “as a growing city there are issues,” but maintains they must be tackled in a joint effort with the school district, province, police and federal government.

“It’s important to look at each piece unto itself,” she said.

This includes providing more sporting facilities and programs for youth, she said. Housing, seen as a bigger issue in Vancouver than Surrey in the poll, is also crucial, she said, because a lack of it will exacerbate the problem.

“When you don’t have housing for people, they end up roaming the neighbourhoods,” Watts said. “That’s when you get your petty crime.”

Watts said there is often a perception of fear. A group of youth hanging around a poorly lit area may give the impression that crime is rampant when it has been declining.

RCMP Chief Supt. Bill Fordy said Wednesday the crime rate in the city of 500,000 has been dropping, even if the murder toll last year was above the recent average of 14 a year.

Canseco said the poll results indicate that Watts is well-connected to her electorate.

“This is why it makes it more complex for anyone who wants to challenge her,” he said. Crime is “not an issue that makes people uneasy about her leadership.”

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